LiTeClick is a bluetooth-controlled system of LED lights and lightbulbs that can be controlled with a mobile device. The project is still in the works, but everyone interested can see its capabilities and future characteristics here: LiTeClick Official Website.

Believe it or not, some of the phones and tablets out there do not have an LED to notify when there is a message or email. This means, if the devices on silent, the screen needs to be turned on to check if there’s any new notifications. As luck would have it, there are several applications in the Google Play Store to solve this problem.

NoLED

NoLED is the first application like this I ever used. The way NoLED works is to add an icon to the screen like a screen saver when a message is received. The default icons are nothing more than a colored pixel-like square on the screen. It moves around the screen. If there is more than one notification needed, more squares are added to the screen. The notification squares can be changed to icons for popular Android applications.

BubbleBuzz

BubbleBuzz is similar in the way it works. When a message is received, a notification icon will be displayed on the screen. The difference with BubbleBuzz is the icons are a bit more fun. The different application icons are floating around the screen in individual bubbles. To open the app, tap on the bubble to pop it and the app opens. BubbleBuzz also lets you automatically disable itself when the battery drops below a certain level.

iLED – The Notifier

iLED has pretty much the same features as the other two apps in this list. One noticeable difference here is the background image can be changed. Instead of having just a plain black or colored background, add an image of something of interest. Make sure the background is not too busy or the icons will be hard to see. iLED works with a lot of the popular preinstalled Android apps like Gmail and SMS/MMS message apps.

While it may not be the cheapest, probably the fastest and easiest way to spice up any basement or outside area is to add colored lights. We’ve looked at KickStarter projects in the past that are WiFi enabled smart LED lightbulbs, but these are very expensive per light and only illuminate a small circular area. The other solution is to use LED strips, those long single row ropes of LED’s that can easily be hidden under a bar or inside an entertainment system. Now, I have looked around the internet before for these and buying one is actually a lot more expensive then it initially seems because they have to include their own power adapter and most of them cannot be wirelessly controlled or change color. As you can probably guess, this is exactly what this weeks project, iGloLED does. Like most of our KickStarter projects this operates via WiFi and includes a host of options for customizing the color. If that is not enough there will also be an available SDK which means that this bad boy is open to the public and all of their programming brilliance.

While this is not cheap, the KickStarter price to get the base powered strip package is $200, neither is the competition. Besides, included is 5 meters of color changing LED’s; that’s a whopping 16 feet. These can be daisy chained up to each other twice to form a 10m segment, but anything longer then that requires a separate power supply. Speaking of the power supply, with most LED lights power supply is something that is generally left up to the consumer. The lights do not come with a standard outlet socket and need a 12V DC current to operate, which means that they require an additional power converter just to operate. With iGlo everything is included in one bundled package, and the power converter, which is UL certified allows the user to individually control each set of lights, and the mobile app is capable, in theory, of supporting up to 255 separate controllers. So for any bar owners or car enthusiasts, or even just those who are looking for a professional and quality way to add some dimension to a basement or living room take a look at iGloLED on KickStarter and help get this project the funding it deserves.

Looking through KickStarter today I saw a project that totally reaffirmed my appreciation for the creativity and originality of everything the internet and start-ups have to offer. Large companies generally target their products for one specific use and either because of a lack of or stifling of creativity these products rarely serve multiple, diverse functions. As I mentioned before with my look at the Portable Scoreboard, giving a product as many different and diverse uses is nothing but a good thing. Especially if that product is open to full user customization which is something that the corporate world treats like the Plague. Allowing internet users to come up with uses for a product is a no-brainer as it takes the creative forces of millions of people and puts them to work on this product; merely give them the tools in an attractive package and sit back.

This has reached, as far as I am concerned, its apex with L8 SmartLight, an 8×8 RGB LED grid that offers a mind boggling amount of possibilities with a bevy of internal sensors as well as an open SDK. The front face is a 8×8 grid of square lights each consisting of a large RBG LED lights as well as a very powerful super LED on the back. This allows the L8 to give off two different colors of light which makes for stunning, dynamic ambiance lighting. But that is only the tip of the iceberg, because the device is Bluetooth capable and programmable from a computer or smartphone it can do almost anything thanks to an ‘if-this-then-that’ set up. This means that the SmartLight can display Facebook notifications, text messages, phone calls, email alerts, GPS turn by turn directions and much more with its extremely portable and powerful super bright LEDs. The SmartLight also includes temperature, proximity, and luminosity sensors which means that it can double as a night light, display the temperature, and adjust to changing room conditions. Two sample situations on the project’s KickStarter page are making the ambiance lighting on a balcony or porch reflect the temperature outside, and having the L8 display current weather conditions and traffic updates as soon as it senses the user arise from bed or enter the bathroom in the morning.

The incredible amount of uses for this device are what really make it one of the best KickStarter projects I have seen. In the morning it can be used to display weather and traffic, then at work it’ll silently alert for incoming emails and back at home for incoming calls and texts, and finally later at night if company comes over for some dynamic mood lighting. The starting pledge to receive a L8 SmartLight is $69 and while it initially seemed steep; the more I thought about it the more I realized how good of a deal it was taking into account how simple this device is to program and use. I recommend immediately taking to KickStarter and making sure this project gets to market as soon as possible.